


Prepare Yourself, Repair Yourself

by earthbourn



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Black Tie Only episode, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pacifist Route (Detroit: Become Human)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-10-13 02:54:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20575262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earthbourn/pseuds/earthbourn
Summary: A series of short fics/scenes both pre- and post-endgame, including angst, fluff, and smut.As Connor learns about humanity from his favorite human, Hank realizes there's a lot he didn't know.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place after the Kamski mission. Connor spares Chloe.

Gusts of wind nudged the car toward the rumble strips and flung fat snowflakes against the windshield as they left Kamski’s mansion behind. One at a time, Hank pressed his aching hands against the air vents, waiting for some warmth. Connor’s hands, resting flat on his knees, weren’t pale or chafed, weren’t shaking slightly the way Hank’s did when he got too cold. 

Hank flicked on the windshield wipers and leaned forward, making a show of focusing on the road. He didn’t look over during the long moment that Connor watched him.

“Do you think it’s possible that I’m a deviant?”

Hank frowned. Something about that word made him uncomfortable. “What the hell would you ask me that for?” Connor didn’t press him, just waited for an answer. “I don’t think refusing to shoot someone means there’s something wrong with you, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Connor finally looked away, but Hank knew that was no real answer, so he tried again. “You said you know what you are and what you’re not. That’s more than most humans can say for themselves.” The rearview mirror reflected an empty road edged with snow. “We look in the mirror and ask ourselves if we’re good people, and the best we can do is, ‘I hope so.’” He wanted to say that it was the asking that counts, but he didn’t believe it.

“How do you tell apart your...feelings?” Connor clasped his hands together, thumbs side by side. Who thought to program that anxious tic? Or did he learn it from somewhere? “Am I ascribing human ideas to relationships to contextualize them, or am I creating new thought patterns outside my program?”

“You lost me there, kid.”

Eyes locked on the blurring scenery outside his window, Connor drew his worry coin from his pocket, but held it still. With the coin pressed tight between thumb and forefinger, Hank could see front and back: heads on each side. Not either/or. Both.

After miles of silence, Connor’s voice barely rose above the whistle of the wind. “Why were you angry with me for protecting you at the tower?”

“It’s not--” Hank thumped his palms on the steering wheel. “I don’t have a supercomputer for a brain, Connor. I can’t process holding you while you die, and just get over it when you show up good as new.”

“So when my last model was deactivated, you felt scared. And hurt.”

Hank chewed his tongue, tried not to visualize the bright, brown irises wavering almost imperceptibly, a detail that in a human would be unremarkable. 

“I understand,” Connor said. “I was scared too.” The coin turned over and over in his fingers. “I wondered, when they upload my memory, what if that’s not me? What if I have the facts, but not their significance? I was afraid I wouldn’t know you, even if I remembered you.”

“You’re talking nonsense, Connor. Just slow down.”

His back stiffened and he gripped the door handle. “Would you stop the car, please?”

“Hold on. What the hell for?”

“Lieutenant, please stop the car.”

Snow crunched under the tires like the complaint of old bones as Hank pulled over onto the shoulder. Connor stepped out deliberately, almost mechanically, planting one foot at a time on the uneven ground. He didn’t turn around when Hank asked where he was going. “I just need a few minutes to myself.”

Hank threw off his seatbelt, yanked his phone from his pocket, and set his music to shuffle. He was most comfortable when the death metal was loud enough to hear the squeal of fingertips on frets, loud enough that he didn’t have to think. How could he, a depressive disaster with a love of self-destruction, give anyone advice on coping with trauma? In fact, that’s what freaked him out the most, the idea that Connor already understood more than Hank allowed himself to understand. What the fuck did Connor know about him? What the fuck could this android possibly know about this washed-up sack of shit that he would want to remember?

Bullshit. Trying to parse whatever chemical accidents in the brain passed for emotion was bullshit. That’s what alcohol was for, and other antidepressants.

When Connor returned almost ten minutes later, he brushed the snow from his coat and shoes before climbing back into the car. But the flakes resting on his cheeks took just a moment too long to melt, lingering there as he snapped his seatbelt in place and turned to smile at Hank. “I apologize for the interruption, Lieutenant. And for the unusual line of conversation. I’m ready to proceed now.”

“It’s okay to feel things, Connor.” The back end of the car skidded slightly as Hank pulled back onto the road. “It’s part of, you know...knowing other people. Caring about them.”

“I agree. I don’t want to lose that.” His foot tapped on the floor, crinkling a plastic takeout sack. “For that reason, I will try to take fewer personal risks during our investigation.”

Hank laughed. “Appreciate it. And I’ll try to stop making you save me.”

“I would do it again.”

This time, Hank met his eyes for a brief second. He thought again about Connor’s question. How do you tell apart your feelings?


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hank won't talk about their relationship, but Connor knows a way to get what he wants.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Post-game. Connor is rooming with Hank.

“This movie is shit.” Hank set his empty beer bottle at the end of the row. Six.

“It has an aggregated critics’ score of thirty-seven percent,” Connor said, but he wasn’t using his primary processing functions to watch it. Not paying attention, in human terms. “Should I tell you how it ends?”

“You know you’re not supposed to cheat.” 

“I can gather information from the ten most relevant web pages about this film in less than a second. It’s kind of hard not to cheat.”

“I’ve seen it before, anyway.” 

“Then we’re even.” The way Hank’s toes wiggled slightly in his socks almost made Connor lose the thread of the conversation. It had been almost a week since he had told Hank of his romantic feelings. “We’d better put a pin in that one,” Hank had said, and the idiom didn’t make sense to Connor in the context. Either Hank reciprocated his feelings, or he didn’t. What was the sense of waiting to discuss it?

Connor should have been relieved that his admission didn’t damage their friendship, that they could still stretch out on the couch together and watch “shit” movies. But that was the problem with emotions: they didn’t listen to logic, and their demands were insistent. He had to find out how Hank felt, and the way forward was obvious. Compared to androids, human decision-making is highly influenced by their bodies. They are most suggestible through the physical.

With a little sigh, Connor scooted closer to Hank, so that their arms were touching. When Hank didn’t react, he leaned his head onto Hank’s shoulder and registered the spike in his pulse. Connor waited almost a minute, aware Hank was watching him, before looking up into his eyes. 

Connor would have preferred to state his intentions, to receive Hank’s explicit permission before making any sort of contact, but he knew that speaking would have snapped Hank out of the moment. So instead he pushed himself up on one arm and pressed his lips against Hank’s. When Hank drew in a sharp breath and started to draw back, Connor placed a hand on the back of his neck. If he could just prove that he knew what this meant, that he knew what he wanted, maybe Hank wouldn’t object.

When Hank returned the kiss, Connor was nearly overwhelmed by the rush of heat, the bitterness of alcohol. It was not what he imagined, but Connor was sure this was how it should feel. He scraped his teeth against Hank’s lower lip. Hank started to protest, but Connor shushed him, and thrilled at the corresponding rise in Hank’s temperature.

Pressing his advantage, Connor moved to Hank’s neck and found a tender spot to linger. He wasn’t sure whether Hank’s gasp of “Christ” when he bit down was good or bad, so he eased off and sucked gently, then admired the blood rising to the surface around his teeth marks. The thought of leaving a mark on Hank, a sigil of a bond, excited him, and he slipped a hand under the waistband of Hank’s sweatpants. 

The heat under his fingertips reminded Connor that his hands would be colder than Hank was used to, but it evidently wasn’t unpleasant. Since becoming a deviant and learning to process his feelings, Connor had been too nervous to do much experimenting by himself, but he understood enough of the mechanics to finish getting Hank hard. When Hank bit his lip and tipped his head back, the warmth between his legs so intense that Connor could swear it was registering in his own abdomen, Connor knelt in front of Hank and took his dick into his mouth.

This was, somehow, entirely different from kissing. Connor had expected it to be less exciting, since there would be no exploring teeth and tongue to reciprocate the stimulus, but his first thought was of tasting an activated coal: salt, musk, fire. Connor wondered, briefly, if this would be damaging on his hardware; after all, his tongue was a delicate sensory instrument. But the stinging heat felt too good to stop.

When Hank’s fingers twisted in his hair, Connor remembered why he had initiated the encounter in the first place, and found it difficult to keep still, between wanting to kiss Hank again, to wrap his arms around Hank’s neck and press their foreheads together, to keep doing exactly what he was doing to make Hank’s breath so beautifully ragged.

He looked up at Hank, overjoyed to note his flushed cheeks and parted lips, but when Hank opened his eyes and stared back, the expression was wrong.

“Connor, stop.”

“Are you sure?” What had he done wrong? Had he accidentally hurt Hank?

“Yes, goddammit, I’m sure.” He didn’t look at Connor as he tucked himself away.

“I’m sorry. I--”

“Don’t fucking say you’re sorry.” Hank brushed his hair from his face and rubbed his eyes. “Don’t just fucking sit there. Get up.”

Connor clambered to his feet. “Hank, please forgive me. I was wrong to attempt to influence you sexually.”

Hank leaned forward and rested his forearms on his knees. “I told you, don’t apologize. I’m the piece of shit who let you do it. I knew better.”

“I misread your feelings. I’m not as adept at understanding emotions as I thought.”

“Me either.” With a long sigh, Hank heaved himself off the couch and staggered off to his bedroom.

Connor gathered up the line of beer bottles and dumped them in the recycle bin. Sumo, asleep in the kitchen, perked up at the clink of glass, and Connor sat down beside him to scratch his ears. He ran over the scene again and again, trying to make sense of it. Hank’s vitals and body language all suggested he was enjoying the encounter. Was it possible that a human’s body and mind could disagree? Why was Hank always so difficult to understand?


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tonight, relationship limbo is black tie only.

Outside the ballroom doors, Connor tapped Hank’s shoulder and spun him around to straighten his bowtie, which matched the deep scarlet of his cummerbund. 

Hank yanked the bowtie crooked again. “Fuck off.”

“I suppose it shows your individuality this way.”

“Sure, this monkey suit really sets me apart from everyone else in monkey suits.” Admittedly, the pair looked quite different from each other. Hank’s American-cut suit was boxier and less stylish than the Italian two-button and bright blue necktie he had picked out for Connor. Hank wriggled in his jacket and tugged at the sleeves. “I look like you back when you wore that ridiculous robo-detective outfit.”

Connor smiled and leaned in close to his ear. “You look very handsome.”

Hank scoffed. He opened the door for Connor and bowed him in. “Welcome. You’re in for a treat, if you like shit alcohol, brown-nosing assholes, and being bored to death.”

The annual gala for the Detroit Police Officers Association was Hank’s only incentive for proper grooming and socialization outside his usual circles, and Connor wouldn’t let him miss it.

After checking their coats and crossing onto the main floor of sparkling golden tile, Connor linked his arm with Hank’s.

“I don’t think most guys take their partner as their, you know...date,” Hank said. The admission, though noncommittal, was a win for Connor, who had yet to draw Hank into any serious discussion of their relationship.

“Wouldn’t want to get separated, lieutenant.” Connor snatched a champagne flute from a passing tray and pressed it into Hank’s free hand. While he didn’t like to encourage Hank’s drinking habits, the champagne was low in alcohol and would help Hank feel more at ease. “This should keep you busy,” Connor said.

“Yeah, for a minute.” In one swig, Hank half-emptied the glass. “Might as well serve these with a fucking umbrella.”

“Your limit is four,” Connor said, and laughed at Hank’s open-mouthed look.

Hank wanted to go right for the bacon-wrapped shrimp, but Connor made him go once around the ballroom first. For all they’d heard Fowler grouse about the precinct’s budget, about the mayor “tightening the belt around the department’s neck,” the DPD went all-out on the gala. Each glittering black bar-top table was ornamented with a spray of white irises resting in a jar of smooth agate (from the Detroit River, Connor noted). The stage at the back, where awards would be presented, was draped in deep blue banners with the department’s crest, and ringed with marble columns bearing more irises. While the snow flurried outside the doors and gathered in mushy tire tracks, melting from the hair of newly-arrived guests, the votive candles at each table brought golden warmth to the assembled faces, human and android alike.

The pair drew up at a table surrounded by detectives they knew from the precinct.

“Evening, everyone,” Connor said, finally releasing Hank’s arm. Hank gulped his drink and made an unintelligible noise of greeting.

Detective Hugo tipped her glass toward Hank. “Surprised to see you here. Connor drag you along?”

“The lieutenant attended of his own free will. He appreciates the opportunity to socialize with his colleagues in a non-work setting.”

Hugo’s large hoop earrings glittered as she tipped her head back and laughed. “That sounds like something he’d say. But I get it. The wife made me come, and now she’s abandoned me for the lettuce wraps.”

Hank shifted from one foot to the other. “We’ll probably get out of here as soon as the talking’s over.”

“I’d rather be gone before then,” Hugo said. “Rather not see Reed’s shit-eating face when he gets his award.”

Glasses rattled as Hank slapped his palms on the table. “Reed as in Gavin Reed? As in Shitbird Ass-for-Brains Reed? As in--” He whipped around to face Connor when a heel came down on his foot. “You knew about this?”

“The names of all honorees were listed on the program sent with the invitation.” Connor glanced around the table, but no one spoke up. “I assumed it wouldn’t bother you because you aren’t in competition with Detective Reed. His accomplishments don’t mitigate yours.”

Resting his elbow on the table, Hank reached for his glass, but found it empty. “What’s that puffed-up prick getting an award for, anyway?” Everyone chose the moment to sip from their own glasses, except Connor, who had taken out his coin and was studying it closely. “Well? Am I talking to myself?”

Connor put the coin away. “Detective Reed is being recognized for exceptional cooperation with the new android members of the precinct.”

“Hugo, is he shitting me? I can never tell.”

“Nope. Reed and the new choir boy version of Connor rolled up a whole ring of gun smugglers last month.”

Hank pursed his lips, seemingly considering the new information. He knew about the RK900, of course; Gavin had volunteered to partner with the new android, said his work computer needed an upgrade. “And since you get on so well with yours…” he’d said with a leer at Hank.

Waving his empty glass at the other detectives, Hank left the table. After a minute, Connor excused himself and caught up with Hank where he was leaning against a wall, holding another champagne but not drinking. 

“Are you angry about Detective Reed?” Connor asked.

“What do you think?”

“If anyone should be resentful, it’s me. Reed nearly killed me, just because he could.”

Hank narrowed his eyes. “But you’re not resentful, are you? You just let it go.”

“I don’t see the point in escalating a conflict with another detective. Do you have a problem with that?”

“I don’t like how he talks to you. I don’t like how he talks about you.” Hank stared past Connor, his gaze shadowed by the bright lights overhead. “And I don’t think he should get away with it.”

Connor moved to block Hank’s field of vision. “You shouldn’t hold a grudge on my account, and I don’t need you to fight my battles.”

“You’re right.” Hank lifted his glass, evidently changed his mind, and set it on the nearby table before brushing past Connor. 

Even though a quick scan of the crowd told Connor exactly where Hank was going, the argument had already begun by the time Connor reached him.

In his dress blues, starched and shined from tip to toe, Gavin looked like a different person. Until he opened his mouth. “Jealousy’s a good look on you, Hank.”

“Wait till you see it from the floor.”

Connor noted the tension in Hank’s muscles and his slightly elevated heart rate, and decided the situation had already gone too far. “That’s enough, Hank.”

Gavin crossed his arms, grin widening. “Look who came to the rescue. How cute.” He glanced around the room. “Where’d my robot run off to? I want to see whose is tougher.”

For Connor, Hank’s step back to ready his punch was more than enough time to foresee the attack and grab his arm. “We’re leaving. Now, lieutenant.” He turned Hank toward the door, ignoring Gavin’s barking laugh. Hank jerked his arm from Connor’s grasp and pushed his way through the crowd.

Outside, a lamp above the back door turned the snow-covered walkway gold. Connor handed Hank his coat, retrieved from the coat check after Hank stormed out. “I told you, I don’t need you to protect me.”

“I know you don’t. That’s just how I am.” He brushed his hair from his eyes and walked a little further down the alley. “Sorry I embarrassed you.”

“Mostly I just feel bad for the new android. Working with Reed must be difficult.”

“Nah, he’s probably an asshole too.”

“You think so?”

“Sure. I bet he’s like you when we met, but with a dickhead upgrade.”

Connor thought for a moment. “You’re saying I’m too nice. CyberLife had to modify my personality for the new series so they wouldn’t make the same mistakes I made.”

“No, Connor. Fuck.” Hank held up his hands. “I know I’m the asshole here. I ruined your night out. I’ll make it up to you.”

“Good. You promised me a dance.” With one stride, he crossed the space between them.

“The fuck I did.”

“It was last Thursday. I seem to remember you had just come home from work, and we talked about it while you changed clothes.”

Hank stared down at Connor and shook his head, his mouth a flat line in the unamused expression Connor knew so well. “You don’t ‘seem to remember’ shit. You have a perfect memory. Either you remember something, or it didn’t happen.”

“Fine. I remember you promised me a dance.”

“Were you programmed to be a fuckin’ liar, or is this new?”

“I’ve always been capable of lying to achieve my objectives.” 

Hank wasn’t sure which ticked him off more, Connor’s smirk or the fact that he was already holding out his hand. “If anyone comes out that door, it’s over,” Hank said, accepting Connor’s hand. 

When Connor put his other hand on Hank’s waist, Hank moved it to his shoulder and placed his own on Connor’s side. “Nice try, but I’m taller.” He almost added, “I never let my ex get away with that shit, either,” but decided to just stay silent and be in the moment. No use dwelling on how he always managed to fuck up a good thing.

And it was a good thing, pressed close as Connor drew him under the spotlight, swaying gently in time with the lazy flakes falling all around. Hank realized he didn’t care whether anyone saw. Who the fuck had told him he wasn’t allowed to be happy?


End file.
